You are here

Tom Robbins: Save the Date

Appalachian State University Libraries are very excited to bring acclaimed New York Times bestselling author Tom Robbins to the Appalachian State University campus during the Fall 2014 semester. Robbins has just released his memoir, Tibetan Peach Pie: A True Account of an Imaginative Life, and for the first time in more than 70 years he will return to Watauga County, the place of his childhood.

Mark your calendars for his visit, Thursday, September 11, 2014 at 7:00 PM, at Rosen Concert Hall, an intimate venue to hear from this author, who’s been said to use black-belt ninja word skills to write books that critics call hyper imaginative and magical.

Tom Robbins was just a boy when he lived in Blowing Rock, North Carolina, but it was here where he began pounding out stories with his “talking stick."

"Allowed to roam freely in both the streets and the woods, I observed and interacted not only with the wonders of nature but with an assortment of squirrel hunters, rabbit trappers, berry pickers, banjo pickers, moonshiners, tramps, real Gypsies, snake handlers, mule-back preachers (like my grandpa), eccentric characters with names such as Pink Baldwin and Junebug Tate, and perhaps most influential, bib-overalled raconteurs, many of whom spun stories as effortlessly and expertly as they spit tobacco juice." Tibetan Peach Pie: A True Account of an Imaginative Live

We will host an entire week of events to celebrate the homecoming of this author, who influenced the lives of a generation and beyond, including Alumnus and University Library Advisory Board Chair Craig Popelars. Our thanks to Craig for making this visit a reality. More information is forthcoming, including opportunities for faculty to incorporate this once-in-a-lifetime event into their syllabi, and an opportunity to meet and mingle with this writer's writer.

This might be your last chance to see Tom Robbins, who is now in his 80s - this is his last hurrah in writing and touring. Come indulge your unconventional and wilder side- and read or re-read one of his great books: